Five operas in a space of
seven days may seem like a tall order but somehow I managed to do all of them.
The range included works by Fringe companies like Opera Vera (read review here) and Unexpected
Opera as well as those at the Covent Garden and English National Opera (ENO).
To my delight it was an even spread that pretty much captured the kind of
operas happening in London - and my, (oh, my) there are plenty!
Royal Opera House: L'Étoile, Covent Garden ★★★★
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| (Photograph from the ROH website) |
L'Étoile was composed by
Emmanuel Chabrier and premiered at Offenbach's Théâtre des Bouffes in 1977.
Parisians absolutely loved it back then and now, at the Royal Opera House, with
some commendable additions - British comedian Chris Addison, breaking of the
fourth wall with maestro Mark Elder and add-on slapstick dialogue - it is a
fun-packed, entertaining production that I'd happily recommend anyone to see.
Yet if you like your opera serious, sans kinkiness and completely covered with
passionate and I-am-going-to-die-tragically singing, then this one may not be
for you.
However I must admit that
the music glows and is highly addictive. The ROH Chorus sing wittingly to Couplets
du Pal as they celebrate King Ouf's execution by impalement (yeah, I know -
it's very weird!) By the end of it, I was humming a few catchy songs I hadn't
heard before including Le chartreuse verte. The opera is performed
entirely in French, which is a good way to re-cap on your beginner's French
(which you probably left behind after GCSEs), and like a Shakespeare, Mozart or
Strauss narrative, there's a master of disguise, a trouser role, multiple plots
going on and ridiculous love triangles.
Addison and Jean-Luc
Vincent, as Dupont, are the two comedy commentaries who interject throughout
and sporadically, but I favoured this - I thought Addison was actually funny,
especially when he points at the surtitles and realises he's in a real opera!
Elder conducts jubilantly (and happily), and it's not hard to see why with
Chabrier's highly spirited music. Hélène Guilmette (Princess Laoula) melted my
heart with some scintillating singing, and mezzo-singer Kate Lindsey, as
Lazuli, was a great match to her as the wandering pedlar who falls in love. In
Lazuli’s solo aria (in Act 2) Lindsey's voice truly blooms.
Much hilarity is maintained by exceptional performances through Samuel Sakker
(Patacha), Samuel Dale Johnson (Zalzal), Christopher Mortagne (King Ouf), Simon
Bailey (Siroco), Julie Boulianne (Aloès) and Aimery Lefèvre (Tapioca). And the
flamboyant and freshly coloured set designs shouldn't go unnoticed - thanks to
Julia Hansen for the crazy anachronistic satire of the 19th century and Arabian
Night styles. Sadly, this one isn't PC enough for the kids as it is pretty
saucy. No - it's very sexy! Unless they've past puberty then, of course - by
all means, bring them!
English National Opera: The Magic Flute ★★★★
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| (Photo from the Guardian website) |
Things are not getting better for our opera house at the London Coliseum. More negative news keeps
coming in and the most recent is the livelihood of its Chorus which has been
stated to reduce, including the number of opera productions taking place next
year by ENO CEO, Cressida Polluck. With many internationally known musicians,
performers, conductors, directors and classical music journalists signing a
petition via @SaveEno (here), it is only a matter of time before the ENO's management
has to face up to the inevitable and give the people (audiences, singers,
performers, musicians and tax-payers), an answer to their financial dilemma.
Yet in the face of such
crisis, the show must go on and the nation's supposed opera house has
introduced a revival production of Complicite artistic director Simon McBurney,
The Magic Flute, which was first shown in 2013. Admittedly I didn't enjoy that production;
I re-read my review (here), which seemed like I was in agony by the end of it.
Influenced by social media, however, with rave reviews of the revival's opening
night, I got myself a ticket hoping that they were right and luckily I wasn't
disappointed - phew!
The set hadn't changed
much in three years - the ENO orchestra was elevated from the pit and a simple
platform moved in mid-air. The staging was recycled from the last production but
this time round the opera was executed to a better standard. Here's my reasons why.
Firstly, it seemed much
more together; there was no fuss on stage among the performers and they seemed
on top of what they were doing. Secondly, the voices of its brilliant
cast were stronger. This was enhanced by stimulating conducting from ENO’s resident
maestro, Mark Wigglesworth. The grand overture, The vengeance of Hell by
the Queen of the night and blissful duets such as Pa … pa … pa ... were
performed to a hugely satisfied mixed audience of children and adults. And
thirdly, there were Finn Ross's video projections which were previously
implemented, but here introduced with some extra additions, making it more imaginative and mythical (I won't spoil it by telling you what
- visually - happens.) Overall, though, there was a real sense that the performers and
singers believed in the production, making it a far more gratifying
production.
Allan Clayton and Lucy
Crowe performed convincingly as star-struck lovers and although they were not
the comedy starlets, they were able to stay in character while their zany
companion creatures, Papageno (Peter Coleman-Wright), Monostrato (John
Graham-Hall) and Papagena (Soroya Malfi) kept the childish humour of Mozart at
bay. I had seen Crowe perform at the ROH in L'elisir d'amore, so I wasn't
surprised she gave an impressively delicate and sweet sounding Pamina,
particularly in her solo aria in the final act.
Ambur Braid performed
courageously as the wheelchair-stricken OAP version of the Queen. The ENO
Chorus was tremendous in voice and played a pertinent part with McBurney's
tacky paper birds. Coleman-Wright's Papageno, however, was much more
friend-down-the-pub and had other handy gimmicks compared to the last
production's bird catcher, Roland Woods. Though with saying that, they played a
version of Papageno that was entirely their own. Woods was much more sharper in
voice for Mozart's harmonious and witty music while Coleman-Wright wanted to
make the audience laugh – and that’s exactly what he did! James Creswell is the
voice of authority, Sarastro and there was a moment when he looked on to the
audience, as well as his political cronies, and said, 'we are in a crisis!' I thought he was
referring to the ENO crisis but then I remembered this was the bit that they
worry over Tamino's dedication to love and truth - BLAUGH!
English National Opera: Norma
★★★★
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| Alastair Muir |
[From Review first published at CultureVulture.net]
The
English National Opera (ENO) first performed Bellini’s 1831 bel canto opera, Norma this
month. Christopher Alden's production was first presented by Opera North in
2012, which is a co-production with Die Theatre Chemnitz and has toured to Bordeaux ever since. Bellini
put down on paper, 'Carve in your head in adamantine letters:
Opera must make people weak, feel horrified, die through singing' and to many
composers, artists and philosophers they were heavily affected by the
composer's artistry.
Conducted by Stephen Lord, who
demonstrates his aptitude for bel canto repertory, the production was dramatic
in narrative and the music's sublimity that
could only come together from a solid hand (and baton) to guide the roaring and
heartfelt score. The opening night permitted its ENO Chorus to take to the curtain call twice, which was
well-deserved for this chorus-heavy opera. They give a phenomenal performance
as excellent actors and singers. Unforgettable scenes come in the final act
where Norma reveals her treachery to them, and in their pain, they fall to the
ground, then abandon her. It stressed the significance of the ENO Chorus’s
role at the opera house at a time where their status is being compromised and
negotiated by the ENO's management.
Due to a word count I have to follow, I wasn’t
able to put down a couple of things to be wary of with watching ENO’s Norma in my CultureVulture.net review. To
put it bluntly, it is one of those operas that you are really going to love or
really hate, and for me I found that I truly loved the music.
Listening to an opera
where you can completely lose yourself in the music is one of the reasons I
love opera – and Norma is one of those operas, yet the production is, as I said,
dry and woody as the staging, and the only beings capable of moving you are the cast, ENO
Chorus and the gracious music, which has the ability to make you cry and feel
vulnerable.
Another thing to
note is that towards the last act, which was the most musically interesting,
it took a long time to end and in some ways dragged. It was almost approaching
10.30pm and yes, I was tired (having had a long week at work already) but,
surely, there must have been other ways that the production could have more
appealing?
Should you go and
see Norma, stick with it or at least go with the knowledge that there
is nothing visually sophisticated to see and you must take the narrative and magnitude
of the voices as they are.
Unexpected Opera: The Rinse Cycle, Charing Cross Theatre ★★★★★
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| Photograph by Robert Workman |
I am an advocate of the
fringe scene, a place where young and aspiring musicians and performers can
reveal their trained voice and talent to an audience new to opera. Yet opera
aficionados also like to check out small-scale productions too. Who knows if they
might be seeing the next Maria Callas or Placido Domingo? (Honestly, who knows?)
Some fringe opera companies are based locally while others go on tour, and this
week I had the pleasure of seeing The Rinse Cycle by Unexpected Opera. It may
sound rather cliché but I truly didn't know what to expect. The
programme booklet reads, 'Wagner's Ring Cycle Conditioned with comedy and
shrunk to 2 hours' and on analysis it did just that but in an inventive
and intelligent way.
Unexpected
Opera's artistic director, Lynn Binstock is on a mission to bring opera to
those who think it's not for them as well as those who are devout operagoers
through engaging and hilarious productions, and I've seen some funny operas but
this one took comedy to another level. From the very beginning scenes I wasn't
sure when Wagner's Rhinemaidens were going to fly in but it really didn't
matter at this point as I got stuck in to the bizarre laundry stage and
odd props: Patisserie Valkyrie sign post, mermaid aprons, disputed leitmotifs,
an ironed out sword, Norfolk accents and oven gloves for Wotan’s giants.
Somehow Top Gun's Tom Cruise, with a phony American accent, also seemed relevant.
What's
smart about this show is that it eases the audience in with its own
light-hearted story. Ronnie (Simon Thorpe) and ex-opera singer Edith (Harriet
Williams) are the married couple with son, Tim (Edward Hughes) while Hilda
(Mari Wyn Williams) and Robin (Anna Gregory) are like the waitresses from BBC
Comedy 'Allo 'Allo, who go through the trouble of delivering the Ring cycle in
a shrunken down version for the audience sat in front of them.
However Tim didn't hear his dad properly and thought he said Rinse - not
ring, hence, the hypnotic washing machines on stage.
Though
jokes aside, it is only by the end of the first half that you begin to get to
the core of Wagner's music and all of that powerful Wagnerian singing. So while you may have spend the first hour doing stomach crunches in your seat,
you'll be enlightened by real music drama, and the transition is, pretty much,
seamless through the conviction of its passionate cast.
There are
two casts for this production and on the opening night Thorpe sung both baritone
roles, as Wotan and Alberich, yet he also played other characters with strange
accents, including Sean Connery, on his knees and standing up. He gave a sensitive performance for the audience by the second half. The same can be
said for Williams who sung as Fricka and her voice was intense, bold and
alluring - my favourite voice of the night!
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| Photograph by Robert Workman |
Mari Wyn
Williams sung the
prelude of Die Walküre almost effortlessly with utter assurance and she had
multiple roles to go on including Sieglinde and Ronnie's secret flirt. I also
enjoyed tenor Edward Hughes who was marvellous as Siegmund and Siegfried - poor
Tim kept getting confused playing both roles, but Hughes rose to the occasion and
hit all those brave notes!
Gregory
has the vocal prowess for her roles as well ranging from Gutrune and Tim's
knocked up girlfriend. Music director Kevin Lim had a shaky start on the
piano but that was quickly forgotten when it came to performing the pithy and
heartfelt songs sung by the cast.
Some may only
prefer their Wagner operas to be heard as the composer wrote it, or wanted it to be
performed in Bayreuth, but that would be elitist, wouldn't it? For veteran
operagoers who don't mind letting their hair down, having a beer and watching a
cheerful and slightly cheesy opera that speeds through Wagner's 16-hour opera and
neatly trims it down to 2 (with a break in between), then this is a perfect
antidote. This is mutually beneficial for opera newbies, too, who will still get a
taste of Wagner's profoundly dramatic music straight up from a versatile cast.
Hats off to Unexpected Opera for ending my week on a high and making me sing Hoyotoho with the crowd - honestly,
no one predicted that would happen and I love surprises.
